Mao's china

History of The Chinese Cultural Revolution seems to be overshadowed in America by the Cold War. While America was worried about nukes, communists, and how to hate Russia more; the Chinese were trying their best to copy the soviet’s industrial growth. Though John Green explained to me that the original revolution occurred in 1911 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UUCEeC4f6ts) Mao still made massive strides toward the industrialization of China unlike anything that had been seen before.

Mao’s plan was to bring industry and a new world to China involved immense destruction and violence before productivity began. His “people’s democratic dictatorship” made sure that Mao’s face replaced every religious symbol in the nation. Watching videos of this destruction and hatred in humbling for an American. Once Mao had the unrelenting worship of his “democratic” nation he began exporting his country’s grain to Russia. Though this made the country’s industry thrive, the citizens starved. As many at 20 million died of starvation.

Another one of Mao’s brilliant ideas was for average citizens to start making steel in their back yards. Not only do average people not make good steel but it is not very safe and you don’t get very much of it. As fun as it sounds to have a steel forge in the back yard, if I made something out of steel in my back yard, I’ll be damned if I give it to Obama!

Living in a country with religious and economic freedom makes such a revolution hard to understand. Obama asks for “reform” and “change” but as daily life goes, I encounter very few people who actually work for my government. I can only imagine what it would be like to have government officials making sure my work was correctly suited to support the direction of the country. As somewhat of an intellectual (I am getting a degree in literature) I wonder what my role in a Mao controlled country would be. I get upset when mucky-mucks tell me that I have to base my curriculums in common standards to work toward a test. Mao spoke commonly about education but his point more often than not was that anyone teaching should be learning and working towards the industry of their country. He would speak of the intellectual as someone who had no soul unless they were politically grounded in Marxism.

The very idea of intellectualism was beaten down by Mao’s beliefs. As an intellectual I make myself question almost everything I read or hear, but under Mao, an intellectual had no choice but to bow to the Marxist powerhouse that controlled the country. Conversely, is living in a radically underdeveloped country in a modern world such a great thing? What Mao did was evil, but all he wanted was to make sure his country rose to the level of industry that the world now demands. We even refer to countries without industry as “third world.” Anything without industry is considered two worlds away from normal. It begs a difficult question of any leader.